FOR more than 10 years female leatherback turtles have failed to
return to their traditional nesting beaches in south-eastern
Queensland and northern NSW.

The giant, ancient creatures could once be seen waddling and
slapping their way across the same Pacific beaches to lay eggs
where they had once hatched.

Today, nesting is down more than 80 per cent at many sites and,
in some, once-abundant rookeries have almost disappeared.

The leatherback, the world's largest turtle, with an average
life span of 200 years, is threatened with extinction. Poachers
take eggs from nests, adult turtles are caught in fishing tackle -
often dying from cuts, rope burns or gangrenous muscles - or are
poisoned by plastic waste dumped in the ocean. The females are
often killed for oil.

The leatherback is just one of many species being pushed to
extinction by trade and development in Asia-Pacific Economic
Co-operation forum countries.

The decline of China's giant panda, Canada's polar bear and
Thailand's Asian elephant is the dark side of economic progress
within APEC, says the environment group WWF-Australia.

Today, as business leaders and policy-makers gather in Sydney
for APEC's business summit, National Threatened Species Day
commemorates the day in 1936 that the last Tasmanian tiger died in
captivity in a Hobart zoo.

"APEC provides an opportunity for leaders to move trade in a
more sustainable direction," said WWF's program leader for species,
Dr Tammie Matson.

"These leaders represent some of the world's most iconic species
that are threatened with extinction from unsustainable trade."
Illegal logging, destruction of animal habitat for plantations,
agriculture and residential development, over-fishing, poaching and
hunting are just some of the activities driving wild animals, such
as Vietnam's Javan rhinoceros, to the brink.

It is probably the rarest large mammal species, with fewer than
60 thought to survive in the wild and none in captivity. In
Vietnam, where it has been poached for traditional medicine, as few
as 10 are left.